


Wanted

by Anjelle



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Identity Porn, Light Angst, Missing-Nin, Missing-Nin Hatake Kakashi, Secret Identity, Sensor-type Iruka, gen for now but maybe be subject to change
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2020-03-01
Packaged: 2020-10-09 05:21:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20511062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anjelle/pseuds/Anjelle
Summary: Kakashi is your run-of-the-mill hand for hire, except that he's not. Boasting a spotless record with the skills and name to back it up, he's one of the most highly sought after mercenaries in the Land of Fire. He has just one rule:No Leaf missions.Unfortunately, his latest client, Tobi, is looking for just that. And there's no doubt in Tobi's mind that Kakashi will accept.It's only a matter of time.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So this is a little thing I've been working on for some time - I'm a few chapters in and decided it was about time to post the first. It won't be long. Less than 10 chapters, at least. It started from this phase I had where I just really wanted to make a series of stories about missing-nin, which I may still do. At first, I just wanted to write a story about Kakashi and Iruka's friendship. Then I remembered that Tobi was a thing. And boy, was he a thing. Now, I love/hate Obito as much as the next gal, but his Tobi act was probably the most enjoyable part of his character for me. And I don't mean the 'oooh no it's Madara' portion of Tobi's existence, I mean the stupid, weird, pretending-to-be-an-ordinary-Akatsuki-because-my-plans-were-fucked-up-and-this-is-my-life-now Tobi.  
Tobi deserves more fics. I'll give him all of them, I swear it.  
Also, sensor-type Iruka was heavily inspired by flailinginlove's Bingo Book! If you haven't read it and you love KakaIru, please check it out, it's phenomenal. Well, all of their stories are, honestly.

A small roadside tavern sat off the coast of Fire Country. It was half a day’s travel to the ocean, a week and a half to Rivers and a solid month away from Konoha. The body of the small business was built up by aged wood that triggered nostalgia in the minds of patrons sat at the outdoor tables. The world was sky-bright and sunshine for the first time after a long series of heavy storms and travellers were more than ready to take advantage of it.

Amongst those travellers was Kakashi Hatake.

Before him sat a steaming cup of tea and his latest enthrallment, the first book in a new series of smut that piqued his interest. He leaned forward with an elbow propped up on the table, the scent of finely aged wood overpowering the still-lingering mist of rain that rose up from the ground, and he flipped a page. There was an empty plate next to his elbow, a remnant of a long-over meal that was eventually retrieved by the only waitress on staff, and he smiled at her with his visible eye.

She took one glance at his hitai-ate and spun sharply around to make a tactical retreat.

Rude, but Kakashi did not blame her. Being so far between towns, anyone travelling through from Wave, Rivers, Hidden Valleys or Hidden Leaf would have no choice but to stop at the tavern if they hadn’t properly prepared for their journey. They served food and drinks out in middle-of-nowhere Fire Country—good on them for being able to run a business in such a remote countryside—and naturally, a lot of their patrons had questionable histories.

That girl knew too well to keep her distance from missing-nin. She was seasoned at avoiding contact without coming across as impolite, even if Kakashi still found it  _ rude _ , knowing the meaning hidden behind her tactical retreat, and she did smile at his short ‘thank you.’ At the very least, he could admire the ironclad will she needed to work at a place like that.

Kakashi scanned the bottom-most line of the page, the corner of the next between his fingertips. As he turned it, he felt the air beside him shift. He never looked up from his book. He didn’t need to. The body now sat beside him had such an in-your-face presence that it didn’t need to be seen, even if he could make out the telltale sharp imagery of orange, black and red in his periphery anyway.

The stalker was sitting on the bench with his back pressed flush against the table. An elbow was propped up on the wood, resting right next to Kakashi’s cooling cup of tea, and there seemed to be something held lazily in his hand, dangling there.

“Ah, look, I found you!” the man exclaimed, waving his wrist. Dango. He was holding dango. There was an awkward moment where he awaited a response. It stretched for a good few minutes and the longer it did, the worst the moment got. He flailed in desperate demand for attention and almost dropped his dango. Then came the panicked rush to save it. He managed to keep it from landing on the ground, but whatever tension he’d built up with his seamless entrance was now gone.

Kakashi was practiced at ignoring this. It only took two days of that man’s antics for the novelty to wear off.

Tobi—that was what the masked man introduced himself as two days prior—craned back to get a good look at Kakashi’s face. “How rude, Senpai! And after I came all this way to see you!”

Kakashi turned the page again, resting his chin in his palm as he rolled on through his novel at a lazy pace. The tension of the plot was rising, the characters were alone, and he was  _ pretty sure _ that the good stuff was right around the corner. The thought of reading some action was a lot more of a draw than listening to the darkly robed, flailing nuisance that made up his recent stalker.

A hand shot forth and suddenly there was a dripping dango between his eye and the page. He shifted his book out of range and finally looked up, his eye boring dully into the darkened hole of the mask.

“Dango?” Tobi offered, waggling his fingers.

Kakashi’s sigh was long-suffering. The book snapped closed, his page saved by a bookmark, and he slouched a little less to give Tobi his attention. As much as he rather get into the steamy details of his latest read, this guy knew just what to do and say to demand his eyes and ears. Tobi was skillful at working a situation to his favour, at making those around him bend to his will, even if he was so completely inept at pretty much everything else.

“Maa, Tobi,” he chastised, sounding something of a scolding schoolteacher, “bothering me like this is rude, too.”

“You’re right. Sorry, sorry!” He sounded a little too cheerful to actually be sorry. “Hey, hey, have you considered?”

“Tobi,” he warned in much the same scolding tone, “I told you my answer before, didn’t I?”

Tobi stiffened. Then the flailing started up again and he held the dango as a peace offering. “Dango?”

Kakashi stared at it and sighed again. He never bothered to refuse the offer; he just didn’t take it. It was easier to just twist his body around and take a sip of tea than it was to fully acknowledge Tobi in any meaningful way. Tobi acted the fool, but there was something dangerous layered beneath the goofy mask and oversized robe, something unrecognizable hidden within the bumbling idiot persona. Kakashi was far too experienced in that field to be fooled. He weighed his options the night they met and decided that there was no need to confront Tobi or to say that Kakashi had any idea that he was anything more than what he said he was. It was best to play along and allow a practiced act of carefree indifference to sweep him through each interaction. No sense in poking the hornet’s nest.

Tobi whined dramatically before turning away. The mask went up and noises of joy and pleasure soon followed. Once it was back in place, the dango was gone and Tobi was looking quite pleased with himself. Face hidden by the mask, Tobi’s body language spoke in place of detailed expression. He considered Kakashi a moment longer before nodding. “You drive a hard bargain, Senpai. Fine. I’ll double my offer!”

“I don’t accept Leaf missions,” he said plainly as he, too, turned away, pulling down his mask and sipping from his tea. He mainly did it out of spite, but he tried to make it come across as an innocent gesture. Really, they were just two S-ranked criminals posturing. One of them would get bored eventually. Or someone would die. That was par for the course for a missing-nin.

“But—”

“No, Tobi,” he warned. It was patronizing. Very much so. He hoped it came off as such. “If you have a mission involving one of the other hidden villages, I’ll take your offer. But no Konoha.”

“But  _ Senpai _ ,” Tobi groaned like a berated child, the pout clear in the sound of his voice, “it’s only a teensy,  _ tiny _ mission! Honest!”

Kakashi’s eye arched into a smile. “Oh, really?” he asked, encouraging. “Then you’ll have no problem finding someone else to take it.”

Kakashi made to rise from his seat when he was pulled still by a hand wrapped around his wrist. Tobi was there, trying not to flail too much.

“No no no! Leader says it  _ has _ to be you!” Tobi sang the words with melodic ease. The panic was very obviously fake, but Kakashi was too agreeable not to humour him. Tobi was in a good mood, all things considered. “It involves super-secret infiltration!”

Kakashi considered the hand still tight around his wrist, contemplating whether to pry it off like a crowbar or break it in his fist. Both seemed impractical, as Kakashi’s last attempt at attack ended in Tobi phasing through his weapons like magic.  _ That _ was a trick that Kakashi would have loved to learn; he couldn’t seem to copy it with his sharingan. His smile widened in some polite form of threat. “No. Konoha.”

He squeezed Tobi’s wrist until the hand came free, dug out enough ryō for his meal and set it down on the table before heading off into the trees.

“No one dies,” Tobi said and Kakashi stopped. His tone was lower then, calmer, as though there was something deeper being said. But just as quickly as it came, it left. “All we need is information, Senpai! You go in, get us what we need, get out and get paid! Doesn’t that sound like a good deal?”

“You need a plant,” Kakashi translated, tone flat.

“You got it!”

He looked back to glare narrowly at the masked man. Tobi was leaning forward now, elbows on the table and his chin in his hands, looking all sorts of smug where no face could be seen. Expecting acceptance, or at least interest.

Kakashi had been around the block a few times. He knew how grave this mission would be. Scouting and infiltration, while not the dirtiest of jobs, held within them a lot of implications. The information gathered by an unaffiliated plant was never throw-away; oftentimes, it played a crucial role in the downfall of nations. Village secrets. Identities of ANBU. Locations of important documents and items. Kakashi was not loyal, but he wasn’t so detached that he wanted to see mass harm come to the people of his former village. Just because he wasn’t breaking necks in the moment, it didn’t mean that their deaths wouldn’t hang over him another day.

Kakashi faced forward again and Tobi was there, without movement or sound, teleporting like a phantom. Tobi’s hands came together in a pleading gesture.

“Alright, Senpai, alright! No village secrets! Nothing of the sort, promise!” Tobi tilted his head. “Would that be enough?”

Kakashi shoved his hands into his pockets, a lazy slouch to his back as he considered his fellow missing-nin. “Maa, what sort of information are you after, then, Tobi? Senpai is growing very confused.”

“Right! Of course!” Kakashi blinked and suddenly Tobi was up in a tree, feet dangling from a branch. He was pretty sure that man was just showing off. The display of talents was also a warning, a threat—that if Kakashi didn’t comply, he’d be up against an ability like that. Well. Kakashi could handle himself well and good, and he was confident that he would figure out the trick to Tobi’s teleportation after a good, solid fight between them, so he wasn’t bothered. But he  _ was _ curious. Just a bit. “We’d like the kyuubi, Senpai! We just want information on the jinchūriki and nothing else!”

His mind flashed to red hair and a sunshine-bright smile that reminded him too much of the calm blue skies above. Kushina was someone he hadn’t thought about in a long, long time. His memories were still clear as day in his mind, of harsh words and the submissive smile of the man who became the Fourth Hokage not long after Kakashi set out into the world. Kakashi liked to think that he severed all of his bonds the day that he walked across that bloodsoaked battlefield and into the nothingness of the forest, but at times like those, he was hard-pressed to believe it. Some ties were harder to break than others.

Kakashi considered the eerily cheerful man above whose legs were swinging back and forth with unwarranted cheer. He thought of accepting, of using it as an excuse to himself to make a trip back to his roots, to set foot in a village that he’d long since abandoned. Information on Kushina would not be all that hard to supply. He could have listed off facts on rotation right then and there.

He told himself that he hated excuses. He told himself that and yet there he was, brow arched and head cocked to the side.

“You’ve got me curious.”

Tobi made a loud, sharp exclamation, flailed, and promptly fell out of the tree. His body crashed into the brush below and Kakashi stared down at him, heaving a sigh.

He gave himself three hours before he started to regret this.

* * *

Kakashi crouched in the low branch of a tree as he observed the workings of Konoha’s front gate below. Familiar faces were stationed in the booth—Izumo and Kotetsu, all grown up and looking like fine shinobi. A part of him wanted to jump down, ruffle their hair and tease them about how much they’d grown. Of course, he was in no position to do so. Today was all about observation; entering the village itself could come either in the night or tomorrow, depending on what his time there found. So far, watching the workings of the gate guards was about as interesting as watching paint dry; the most eventful thing to happen all day was a merchant trying to set up shop inside the village without a permit. Watching Izumo go off on the poor fellow was amusing for all of ten minutes before Kakashi found himself sighing and resisting the urge to pull out his pocket novel.

Part of the reason he was taking his time, testing the waters, was to analyze Konoha’s detection. Were there a sensor type anywhere on guard, Kakashi wanted to be sure his chakra suppression was ironclad. Being detected snooping around the perimeter of the village walls was a lot easier to deal with than being detected in the heart of the village. Kakashi was confident, not stupid, and he didn’t need to risk his safety just for a meager paycheck.

Those days were over.

When, by sunset, no Leaf shinobi had so much as glanced his way, Kakashi affirmed that his cloak, while rusty, was just as solid as it had been in his jōnin days. The sky was darkening fast and he made a tactical retreat, dipping back into the forest, away from the wall, before dropping the cloak. He grabbed a sealing scroll out of his back pouch and laid it across the forest floor to get to work. The loose, casual robes he wore were exchanged for something a little more form-fitting, a little easier to maneuver in, should confrontation arise. Weapons that he usually didn’t resort to—kunai, shuriken, and even a tantō—were placed on his person as a precaution. After all, this was the strongest hidden village he was up against; it wouldn’t do well to underestimate them.

He felt the air shift and twist behind him and sighed.

“Maa, Tobi,” he chastised, “you’re being rude again, watching me like that.”

When he looked back, Tobi waved. “Howdy!” he greeted with his usual cheer, skipping up to Kakashi’s side, his mask facing the unpacked scroll. He bent forward, hands on his knees and noises of wonder escaping him as he took in all of Kakashi’s supplies. “Wow, Senpai! You sure do look prepared!”

Kakashi watched him dully, shaking his head. By that point, he’d resigned himself to the understanding that Tobi was watching him more or less wherever he went, whether from boredom or order from his leader. He conveniently popped up whenever Kakashi was alone between tasks, meaning that he was watching during the inbetweens, too. His presence remained undetected by Kakashi, though.

Really, what did they need him for? Tobi could have no doubt infiltrated the Leaf any time that he wanted.

Tobi dipped down and reached out, snatched one of the books off of the surface of the scroll and dusted it off. He hummed in the back of his throat, amused and curious as he turned the book over in his hands, eye lingering over the ‘explicit’ label on the back. “Wow, Senpai! How bold!”

“I’m well-read,” Kakashi supplied absently as he counted the remaining items once he was all suited up. He had sixteen spare shuriken, eight spare kunai, a fully-stocked med-kit, enough ration bars for eight days, and a standard sealing kit. And perhaps enough reading material to get him through at least two months of unrelenting boredom. Humming his approval, he sealed everything back up in his scroll. All that was left was the book in Tobi’s hands.

Kakashi rose from his crouch and glanced at the man from the corner of his eye. Tobi was distracted, somewhat more than usual, with his attention fixed to the back of the book. That made it easy to  _ really  _ look him over. He was cloaked in a long, black robe with crimson clouds patterning its surface—Akatsuki robes, Kakashi’s mind supplied. He’d heard whispers now and then of the organization but no one had a clear idea of what their goals were. The jinchūriki were involved, apparently.

Well, Kakashi didn’t particularly care. It wasn’t his business and he was getting paid.

The book in Tobi’s hands was  _ Icha Icha _ , the very first entry in the series. Kakashi may have no longer been a Leaf shinobi, but that didn’t mean that he couldn’t appreciate the writings of one. Jiraiya’s book had been his first dip into the world of adult literature and he never went back.

“Keep it,” he said when Tobi’s quiet stretched a little too long, as though deeply considering something very profound, which was very much not a Tobi thing to do.

Tobi’s head snapped up. Then there was flailing. “Oh, no no no, Senpai! You don’t have to! Tobi was—”

“Keep it,” he repeated, rolling up his scroll and slipping it back into his pouch. He dropped the subject there, watching his well-worn book slip soundlessly into Tobi’s robes. Then his attention turned to Konoha’s walls, just barely poking out from above the treetops. Nostalgia pooled in his gut at the thought of slipping past to the other side but he forced it down, out of his eyes and heart as he turned a hard eye on Tobi. Acceptance of the mission came with the clause that Kakashi was doing things  _ his _ way. His way saw the least collateral. His way kept everything contained.

Kakashi would keep himself hidden. Konoha would be completely unaware so long as he could help it. All he needed to do was get in, observe Kushina for a time, and leave. Present the written notes to Tobi, get paid, and get out. He was expecting a two week mission at most.

“Keep your distance,” Kakashi cautioned, thinly veiled threats in his eye. Then he was smiling, so utterly patronizing. He was surprised that Tobi let looks like those roll off him like water; at some point, it became Kakashi’s own  _ personal _ mission to aggravate Tobi. So far, his efforts were fruitless. Nothing could crack that happy-go-lucky shell. “Senpai has work to do.”

“Roger!” Tobi saluted, then he was gone, his body phasing into nothing.

Kakashi was left standing in the clearing alone with one less book in his arsenal. He pulled on his gloves, let out a sigh, and vanished in a flourish of leaves and wind.

* * *

The Fourth Hokage was a man of courage and tact unrivalled in his time. He was a soft, gentle soul hardened by the atrocities of war, a man who rose to every occasion with the resolve to meet his goals no matter what obstacle stood in his path. He was kind, painfully kind, and something of a father to his students, all of which had no one left to fill that role. Minato Namikaze was everything a leader needed to be, both soft and strict, caring and calculating. A brilliant fighter, a brilliant tactician, a genius in his own right. The husband of Konoha’s jinchū riki, the hero of the third shinobi war, the Yellow Flash of the Hidden Leaf. To Kakashi, though, Minato was more than a role model. Minato was a teacher, a friend. Family. Minato was the last remaining shard of a shattered team that became the casualty of a forgotten era.

The Fourth Hokage lost his life after his first year in office. No information was leaked on how, so Kakashi was uncertain of the circumstances, but his instructor was long since dead. The lack of knowledge was knowledge in itself, though: it was post-war, so it wasn’t on a standard battlefield; there was no obvious backlash, so it was doubtful that the kill was claimed by shinobi from a rival village; and it was kept contained, meaning that it was a burden that Konoha bore alone, a failure that it didn’t want to share beyond its walls.

Just one more thing to be bitter about, Kakashi supposed. 

Minato was dead. Kakashi understood that as he crouched on the roof of his leader’s old home, a relic of the past dark and abandoned in a village he thought that he would never see again. He closed his eye and focused on the space within the building, allowed a steady flow of chakra to seep through the roof and walls and envelope the whole thing in the sensitive buzz of his own energy. Kakashi was not a sensor type, but there were ways around that. Of course, Kushina  _ was _ , but she wouldn’t notice him with how little chakra he was infusing—not unless she was looking for it, and there was no reason for her to be. He frowned as he scanned the house with practiced care. There was nothing inside. He wondered if she had moved or simply wasn’t home. Before the start of his mission, he needed to locate the jinchūriki. There would be no information gathering until he did. That was his justification when he unlocked one of the windows and slipped inside.

The wafting scent of rot hit him first and he covered his nose—rotting  _ wood _ which, while unpleasant, was not the worst thing he could have scented. His fears were confirmed when he saw the thick layers of dust and cobwebs that decorated the abandoned furniture of his teacher’s old home. Nobody lived there. Kushina must have moved after losing her husband, or—

_ ...Or. _

Kakashi did not finish that thought.

He lowered his hand and adjusted to the smell as he wandered from one room to the next. Everything was just as he remembered it, albeit aged by a decade. The pictures on the walls hadn’t changed, the bed was messy, sheets thrown haphazardly across a nest of pillows, and on the nightstand sat a lone picture frame. Kakashi took it carefully in his hand and held it up, brushing the fog off the glass. Four faces stared back at him, relics of better days.

He smiled and wondered if Minato would chastise him as he took off the back of the frame and slid the picture free. He justified the theft by remembering that this place was abandoned, that everything inside was forgotten.

Kushina would not have left so many pictures behind, widowed or not. Those images were pieces of time with her precious people.

Kakashi’s mind supplied him with answers that he did not like and he blocked out the world as he let himself mourn.

* * *

Kakashi stood, fully concealed, in Konoha Memorial. Lazy hands slipped into his pockets as he watched the tombstone with bittersweet fondness, lightly tracing out the engravings with his eye. He soaked up the names with heavy understanding and then his eye fell to the dates. The same year and, if his hunch was correct, the same day.

_ What happened, _ he wondered. What caused Konoha to lose its Hokage and jinchūriki all in the span of one moment? It was not the fault of an enemy village. No doubt war would have risen back up, especially when tensions ran high so soon after the third shinobi war came to a close. The fault was contained within Konoha. It was Konoha’s mistake.

Kakashi returned a missing-nin to gather intel on a long-dead jinchūriki. This was not his proudest moment.

“Maa, Sensei,” he breathed, shifting his weight uncomfortably before the stone, “I’ve disappointed you again.”

He tried not to dwell on the understanding that his mission—which he willfully accepted—was going to be a lot more troublesome than he initially thought. Having already received half payment, there was no calling it off. What he thought would be a breezy little observational mission, camped outside the jinchūriki’s home with a lot of indulging nostalgia to carry him through the next two weeks, was quickly turning into an  _ actual _ investigation that would further cement him as an enemy to Konoha. There was a mix of resignation and reluctance swelling in his gut. Old loyalties were hard to break.

A warm breeze swept through the graveyard. It carried with it a foreign scent. Kakashi inclined his head to the side and stared curiously at the man that he found there. A chunin, by the look of it, clad in a flak vest, the familiar Uzushio swirl emblazoned across his shoulder and back. His presence was average, at best, and Kakashi didn’t recognize him. Well, he was likely too young to have been an acting shinobi by the time Kakashi abandoned the village, so that was expected.

The man placed flowers in the vase of a family tombstone, his smile soft and warm, and he inclined his head respectfully. There were other offerings already present, the calming scent of incense and a small, wrapped portion of food.

Cloak still in place, Kakashi wandered over at a lazy pace with soundless steps. His eye settled on the names on the tombstone, a husband and wife. This man's parents, likely. But something caused his practiced indifference to falter and his body to go rigid. Both mother and father died in the same year.

They shared their deaths with Kushina and Minato.

Something wasn't right. Kakashi leaned over to check the grave marker between this one and the Hokage's and frowned. Same year.

How? Why?

Kakashi pulled back and released a shuddering sigh, pleased with himself for thinking ahead and utilizing one of the noise cancelling seals from his kit. He rubbed the back of his neck, feeling out the exhaustion from a long night of insomnia, and settled his eye back on the chunin who—

The chunin was looking at him. Not  _ through _ him, but  _ at _ him. Their eyes never met, nor did they wander, but it was very obviously clear that the Leaf shinobi was aware that  _ something _ was there, cloak be damned. His hand moved automatically to his kunai pouch and he waited for the first sign of hostility to act upon.

The man smiled. A long scar cut across the tanned skin of his nose and cheeks, his hair pulled up out of his face and tied back. “ANBU?” he asked, brow arched in amusement. His eyes searched the space that Kakashi occupied with interest, but he saw nothing. Heard nothing. “Sorry, I don’t mean to pry.”

ANBU, huh? The assumption made sense; average jōnin never hid themselves so thoroughly, and the technique Kakashi used was indeed something very similar to what the ANBU used. Kakashi released the kunai from his grip and shoved his hand back into his pocket, shifting his weight as he considered the man before him. Average chunin, and yet this was the only man in the village who showed any sign of being aware of Kakashi’s presence.

The man’s eyes cast to the grave next to Kakashi, Kushina and Minato’s. He twisted around, rummaged through his bag and retrieved more incense. He lit it, left it as an offering to the fallen Hokage’s family, and repeated the ritual he had at his parents’ marker. In that time, Kakashi made to switch spots, curious.

The man located him again with ease and a returning smile. “I understand that ANBU are meant to sever their ties for the sake of the village,” he stated matter-of-factly, “but it’s a bit unfair, don’t you think? To feel like you need to hide yourself even when mourning.”

Kakashi cocked his head to the side. “Maa, traditionally they don’t. A good assumption, though. Full points.” Not that the man could hear him.

“Not that I mean to criticize your organization,” he assured, rubbing the back of his neck. He worked his mouth, looking like he was going to backpedal further before stopping himself and dropping it all together. There was an embarrassed flush to his cheeks, barely there but still noticeable to a sharp eye. The man turned away then, back to Minato and Kushina’s tombstone. “My parents died in the kyuubi attack. It only feels right to pay respects to Lord Fourth when I visit them.”

Kakashi frowned. Kyuubi attack? That was the first he heard of it. Then again, something like that would be kept tightly under wraps. It was the equivalent of a village turning against itself, to have their tailed beast released on their own people.

Everything clicked into place—Kushina and Minato’s deaths, the reason why there were so many graves lined up in a row with the same date. How was the kyuubi released, though? Kushina was nothing if not in perfect control at all times. Her chains kept the kyuubi sealed with stronger force than even Mito before her. How could she have lost that control?

And Minato, where was he? He must have ended the attack; there was no one better suited to sealing left in the village at the time. Minato was a fuinjutsu master.

The question remained: who was the new jinchūriki?

The man gathered up his things and offered another smile. “I should be off. It was nice speaking with you.”

Was it?

The man waved, and Kakashi waved awkwardly back. There was a flash in the stranger’s eyes, something brief an unrecognizable. Then the polite bow of a head, a last, lingering glance, and Kakashi was alone again.

Kakashi narrowed his eye on Minato’s name, dread curling in his gut. It was starting to look like he’d need to take a hands-on approach to this mission.

How unfortunate.

* * *

A swift blow to the back of the neck and the jōnin was laid out motionless at his feet. Kakashi released a long, tired breath and crouched down. He slipped two fingers beneath the cloth of the man’s hitai-ate and pulled it free, staring at the symbol of the Leaf etched across its metal plate, unmarred in a way that his was not. He hummed approvingly. “I’ll be taking this, if you don’t mind.”

The headband wasn’t what this was about, though, and Kakashi started digging through the man’s person, through his pouches and supplies, before finally feeling the thin pages of a small book. Kakashi pulled it free and stared hard at the blank cover.

Konoha’s bingo book.

He thumbed through the pages quickly, taking in the face of each entry with careful analysis. There was relief when he reached the very last page. Kakashi did not have an entry. Konoha never became aware of just what had happened to him. He could use that to his advantage.

Well, by the end of this, he would definitely earn a place there.

Kakashi slid the book back where he found it, rose to his feet, and considered the jōnin one more time before swinging around and wandering back through the trees, away from the village.

“Oh my, Senpai,” he heard and resisted the urge to sigh, “you’re leaving him be? He’ll report you! Oh dear.”

Kakashi could feel Tobi’s presence in one of the trees above, didn’t need to look to imagine the way his legs were swinging back and forth with carefree glee. He stopped, held himself there, and looked up at his stalker with a smile. “Maa, Tobi,” he greeted with false cheer, “nice to see you so soon.”

Tobi let out a gasp. “Is it really? I’m so touched, Senpai!”

The crocodile tears laid on thick, even for Tobi.

Kakashi decidedly ignored it. “It won’t matter. He didn’t see anything.”

Kakashi fell back into step and heard Tobi’s descent, the soft crunch of feet against grass. He wondered, briefly, if he would ever have a moment to himself again. At least Tobi steered clear of the village, if nothing else. The one solace he had was when he was beyond enemy borders.

He wondered how he always got himself into these messes.

“Oh,” Tobi noised. His pace quickened until he was at Kakashi’s side, staring down at the hitai-ate dangling from Kakashi’s hand. “Wow, you’ll go that far for a mission? That’s so moving, Senpai!”

Kakashi smiled again. “Maa, if it comes to it. I have a perfect success rate to maintain, Tobi. I need to do my best.” There was something in there that may have been a subtle jab at Tobi’s own incompetence, but if Tobi noticed then he didn’t say anything.

“Right, right. Of course. Such an honourable fellow, truly an inspiration!”

Oh. So Tobi was mocking back. Kakashi didn’t think he had it in him. He considered the masked Akatsuki a moment longer, very obviously sizing him up—to let Tobi know that he’d noticed—before leaping into the trees. He travelled faster that way, jumping from one branch to the next as he headed around to another side of the village wall. This side was easiest to slip through, less guarded than the others. It was the side where Hokage Rock sat.

Once a comfortable distance away, but close enough that his return to Konoha wouldn’t be much of a journey, Kakashi unsealed his scroll. He hummed as he looked through his things, trying to work out a suitable disguise. Before he’d risk giving out his own identity, he needed to at least try a false one. As much as an unestablished name wouldn’t get him much in the way of useful tips, it would at least help test the waters, help him formulate a starting point.

He was starting to think that this mission was going to last a tiny bit longer than two weeks.

Tobi followed, no surprise there. He was humming a tune as he looked over all of Kakashi’s things and watched Kakashi get suited up with unhidden interest.

“Oooh,” he cheered as Kakashi started with the makeup. It didn’t take much to hide himself—just a wig, a little makeup and a good cover for his scar. The fact that he usually wore a mask helped with the rest. “You sure know what you’re doing! What’s the plan? Can I help?”

Kakashi’s eye arched into a friendly, fake gesture of appreciation. He pulled his hitai-ate up, level on his forehead, revealing his sharingan eye. It was only exposed for a moment, though, quickly covered by his specialty contact lenses. He blinked several times as they settled into place, then looked up at the looming Akatsuki with consideration. “You’re not the most inconspicuous person, Tobi.”

“I can be inconspicuous, Senpai!” he assured, looking around rapidly. Then he was gone, running behind a tree, only part way hidden. “See, look, it’s like I’m nowhere at all!”

Sometimes it was very hard to be patient with him.

Kakashi turned back to his supplies and didn’t remark. There was a wig next. He brushed the strands straight and even to tame the unruly mess made of it within the scroll before slipping it into place, tucking his own hair beneath it.

Tobi popped out from behind the tree after the silence got to be too much for him, arms in the air. “I’m here, Senpai!” he announced hurriedly. “I was only hiding—”

Tobi looked at Kakashi and his words fell away. The flailing stopped, his arms went down, and he stared.

Kakashi arched a brow. “Ah?”

The Akatsuki was silent for a long time, uncharacteristically so. Then his head cocked to the side and he hummed in thought. “Oh my, Senpai, that disguise reminds me of a Leaf clan! Hmm, what was it again…” He tapped the base of his mask with a finger, crossing his arms and thinking. Loudly. “Nohare? Nohoro? Mmm, no, that’s not it… Nu, No…” He snapped his fingers. “Nohara!”

Kakashi’s eyes flickered up, meeting Tobi evenly, and he tilted his head innocently. “Ah, is that so? What a coincidence.”

There were pieces of his past that he hadn’t been able to part with. Sometimes the only way to move forward was to hold onto a piece of everything that was left behind. Rin Nohara was a mark forever carved into who he was. Maybe it was a coincidence. Maybe the disguise he took was an homage to her. Either way, he liked to think that she understood.

Surprising, though, that Tobi knew the name of such an obscure, extinct clan in Konoha.

Tobi considered him a while longer. Occasionally, he would shuffle a few steps to the side, consider Kakashi from a different angle, shake his head, and reposition himself again. This went on for several minutes as Kakashi sealed all of his belongings back up, defaced hitai-ate included, before Tobi sheepishly rubbed the back of his head. “Um, Senpai, it looks good and all, but…”

Kakashi hummed absent acknowledgement as he pulled on a long, concealing coat. It was annoying to move around in, but it was also the furthest thing from clothes that a shinobi would wear, so he’d draw less attention. That was the plan, at least, and it worked on several other occasions when he took this disguise.

“That is to say,” Tobi hedged, ducking his head, “your mask…”

Kakashi looked at him, face blank. He gave the material one swift tug and the mask came down, the material bunched around his neck, looking like an ordinary turtle-neck shirt.

Tobi froze. This time there was no flailing or absent words. It was amusing for all of three seconds before Kakashi got bored and ignored him in favour of slinging his bag—also retrieved from his scroll—over his shoulder. There were questions in the air and he felt a crack in Tobi’s act but didn’t draw attention to it. “I’m not as attached to my mask as you are,” he said simply. Smiled. It was patronizing, and this time he knew Tobi took it as such.

He left first. A swirl of leaves and wind and chakra, and Tobi was alone.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So the updates you see today are likely the last updates you'll see from me... until December. I've decided to join NaNoWriMo this year! I've cowered out every year before this because I never thought that I could do it, and I still kind of don't, but I want to try. I really, really do. So I'm going to be putting all of my fanfiction on halt in the month of November to focus on my original story, Yesteryear, which I've wanted to write for a long time but never had the courage. I love working on fanfiction because I can just jump into it, I can update whenever I like and I have people who want to read it because it's about characters that they know and love. Writing original fiction comes with a lot less support, so I have trouble motivating myself sometimes. But, well, sometimes you have to motivate yourself, right? That's what I'm going to do. Even though I really, REALLY want to write some of these ongoing fanfics I have, one of my biggest problems is that I never focus on just one project, so I'm going to force myself to work on Yesteryear and only Yesteryear in the hopes of reaching that 50K goal. Then, once it's over, whether I've succeeded or failed, I'll be back for more Naruto escapades.
> 
> I know no one really cares about this, but I thought I should explain myself since I'll be disappearing for some time. I also thought I should update with some chapters I've been sitting on so that there's a little less silence. Now I'm going to leave you to enjoy your reading, and I hope you'll all wish me luck until my return! ;v;7
> 
> Also a warning that this chapter is unedited because I don't have time to get to it, so be prepared for typos;;

Iruka rolled his shoulders and yawned, stretching his arms to the sky. The moon was high above the village, casting a haunting glow across rooftops and open streets. Usually, he wasn’t one to accept additional jobs on his day off, but he was also notoriously bad at saying ‘no’ to his peers. That was what got him stuck working at the Mission Desk on his day off. One of the chunin on rotation came down with a nasty bug after a mission and was sent on leave, and good old Iruka was the first one they called in as a replacement. He had a class of thirty papers to grade and a lesson plan to work out for Monday but, well, there was extra pay in his pocket and he, at least, was able to help someone out.

It wasn’t a glamourous life, but it didn’t need to be.

Iruka’s feet led him down a path long travelled, carrying him through scattered streets with practiced ease, and before his tired brain could really register where he was going, he was already pushing aside the noren curtains of his favourite ramen bar and offering the old man behind the counter a polite smile. He sat down and Teuchi greeted him with the usual smalltalk. By this point, he no longer needed to verbalize his order; Teuchi would start making it without a word. It was nice, a thoughtful gesture if he didn’t think too deeply. If he did, well. It was a good indication that he was eating out far too frequently. But whenever he began chastising himself, he brought to attention just how busy he was these days. Unfortunately, as great as home cooked meals were, they were also a big drain on the short hours of freedom that he found in a day.

He yawned again and rested his chin in his hand, closed his eyes and allowed the tantalizing aroma of Teuchi’s world-class cooking to flood his senses and ease his mind. Whenever the world went dark behind his eyelids, his senses spread across the world and he could see  _ everything _ . Even when he did not want to.

Iruka was a bit of an unconventional sensor. He couldn’t come up with names in association with chakra signatures, not unless he was considering them carefully. The impressions he got from people were different but vague, which meant that the only way he could identify them was by focusing really hard or through prolonged exposure. Naruto’s was forever carved into his heart, the first signature he’d ever been able to place. A few of his coworkers’ became frequent enough that he could spot them out of a crowd, and there were certain people like Lord Third that he couldn’t mistake, but Naruto’s was the only one he could actually seek out from any point in the village. In a way, it was a comfort, knowing where the kid was so long as he closed his eyes and they were within range. 

Ah, right. Range. Iruka had  _ very _ short range.

Teuchi asked him about his day, and he proceeded to spill all of the juicy details, which were probably a hell of a lot less interesting to anyone but him. But, well, if Teuchi was bored then he didn’t say it. This, too, was a part of their routine.

Iruka turned his head towards an approaching signature and several moments later, a pale hand was brushing aside the noren. The man was a stranger, someone Iruka never saw before, with soft eyes and an ever-present smile in the natural curve of his lips. Long, purple markings carried down the length of his cheeks, reminding Iruka strongly of clan markings. He looked… friendly. Approachable. As such, Iruka smiled at him.

The man stared back. For a moment, those kind eyes were empty and cold and Iruka’s smile faltered. Then they were soft, warm, and the man smiled back. He took the empty seat beside Iruka and ordered stiffly.  _ Yes, _ Iruka decided,  _ definitely new. _

A large, steaming bowl was set before Iruka and he thanked Teuchi with every fibre of his being as he broke his chopsticks and devoured the ramen with splendor. He hadn’t eaten since breakfast; there were too many distractions during his lunch break to grab himself anything, and he hadn’t packed food ahead of time because of how short notice the shift was.

He felt eyes on him but every time he looked over, the stranger was focused on a notepad, jotting things down with careful consideration. He had to be imagining it. Iruka tended to be on the paranoid side.

Their eyes met and the man was smiling again. Iruka swallowed his noodles and returned the gesture. “You’re new to Konoha?” His tired mind ran through that greeting again and he backpedalled. Lately, his mouth moved faster than his brain. Naruto was a bad influence. “Sorry, that was very forward of me.”

The man arched a brow, resting his chin in his palm. The notepad was left forgotten as he gave Iruka his undivided attention. “Just passing through,” he supplied easily. “I’m a journalist and Konoha seems like a place with a lot of stories to tell.”

“Well,” Iruka considered between bites, “you’re not wrong.”

The stranger’s eyes arched in an extension of his smile and he offered his hand. “Sukea Nohara.”

Iruka considered the hand. That name struck a chord somewhere within him, nagged at him, and he tried to place it but couldn’t. He was too tired for games and if he was still curious then he could dig into it in the morning, after a long night of uninterrupted sleep. He shook Sukea’s hand, firm but gentle. “Iruka Umino,” he supplied. “I work as an instructor at the academy.”

Sukea arched a brow, amusement in his tone, and he looked sympathetic. “Teaching pre-genin school children how to use sharp weapons sounds like quite the job. I do not envy you, Mr. Umino.”

And Iruka had to laugh, because no, it wasn’t always sunshine and rainbows and some days he wondered what made him think that teaching was a good career path to follow. But those days were few and far between, spread across years of rewarded perseverance. He was still fairly new at his job but that didn’t matter. “Fair. It’s worth it, though. Watching them find their way in life.”

“You’re a kind soul, Mr. Umino.”

Iruka was too tired and overworked to be handling that level of unrepentant flattery. He ignored the way that his face heated and waved the man off, searching around for a better topic to switch to. His eyes found the notepad as Teuchi set out Sukea’s order and he leaned forward with interest. “What kind of stories are you looking for?”

Sukea hummed in thought, the steam from his ramen dancing about his face. “Well,” he started, “I’ve been interested in the kyuubi attack, if I’m honest.”

Oh.

Iruka’s smile was gone. He leaned out of the way and confined himself to his own space, mood suddenly soured. It made sense. The demon fox was definitely a topic likely to get a lot of buzz surrounding any article about it, but it wasn’t something that was openly discussed. For a lot of reasons, some personal. Some related to the gag order.

Iruka wasn’t bitter. The repressed hatred that lingered after his parents’ deaths was a long-faded memory. Naruto was the jinchūriki. Knowing that was hard, at first, and he hated himself for his initial neglect of the boy because of it, but overall, well… Naruto was not the fox. Naruto was an amazing, bright-eyed boy with big dreams.

Seeing that boy, the world against him, move past the fox’s curse was something Iruka looked forward to. Maybe Naruto would never know, but he helped Iruka so much with moving on. The kyuubi was not running around, killing Leaf shinobi. The kyuubi was safely contained within Naruto.

For all that the villagers mistreated the boy, Naruto was a hero and Iruka was immensely proud.

“I’m sorry to say,” he sighed, “but I don’t think you’ll have much luck with that one.”

“No?”

He shook his head and offered Sukea his sympathies. With the gag order, no one would be repeating the events of that night to anyone outside of the village.

Points for trying, though.

* * *

Iruka saw a lot of Sukea over the next week, particularly because he visited Ichiraku an unhealthy amount of times. They were nearing final exam season and he found himself staying late in the office, working out all of the kinks. Grading in two weeks, once the exams were over, was going to put him in the hole for a good three days of non-stop marking and stress, and his attempt at salvaging some of his sanity was to get a head start on all of the post-exam work he had to do  _ aside _ from grading. That meant that the only time he'd made it home over the past week was to fall into a dead sleep on his bed.

That meant a lot of Ichiraku. And, evidently, a lot of Sukea. The journalist made Ichiraku his evening base. He used it as a way to start polite conversations with civilians and shinobi alike, jotting down a million and one random facts that would apparently one day string together to form a coherent story, if Sukea was to be believed.

Out of those million and one facts, though, none were about the kyuubi attack. Iruka comforted him that night by paying for his ramen and rubbing soothing circles into his back. Iruka liked to think that Sukea appreciated the sympathy.

The night was short, as was their interaction. Iruka was dead tired and barely awake by the time his bowl was empty and a full stomach only made it worse. He yawned and stretched and said ‘goodbye’ to Teuchi and Sukea as he got to his feet.

Sukea rose, too, with a soft smile. “Let me walk you home,” he insisted, already headed down the street. “I insist.”

Iruka was waving him off, striding on down behind him all the same. “I'll be fine,” he assured, eyes half-closed despite himself. “Really. I wouldn't want to interrupt your work.”

“I’m turning in for the night, myself. I'll be headed back to the inn after I see you home.”

“Oh.” Iruka blinked slowly, considered, and nodded. Sukea could be good company, at least some of the time. When he wasn't asking for facts about the kyuubi. Which reminded Iruka that they needed to have a  _ talk _ about that one of those days.

Ichiraku was close to the academy but a decent walk from his house. The shortest path there took them past the front gates of the village, down into the residential district. Usually, Iruka would use the chance to greet the gate guards, often Izumo and Kotetsu. Sometimes, he brought them ramen, too, or leftovers from his homemade dinners. Right now, though, he was too tired for polite conversation, and Sukea was more than enough company at the moment.

As they passed the gates, though, he felt the buzz of alert chakra signatures around them. He opened his eyes, unaware of just when they slipped closed, and searched the area for the source of the commotion. Soon, he settled on four jōnin and a bound man slowly passing through the gates, and he no longer felt his exhaustion.

Iruka never saw that man before and yet he brandished a Leaf hitai-ate proudly over his one eye and forehead. His body was a bleeding, battered mess. The dark clothes he wore were stained even darker. Blood, he surmised, taking a subconscious step forward. This wasn't right. Iruka knew every jōnin and chunin in the village, aside from perhaps the ANBU, but he didn’t know that man. His arms were bound and covered with chakra suppressants and he staggered forward with painstaking steps. The people walking by stopped to watch and soon there was a crowd forming. Whispers followed—the kind of gossip that Iruka always insisted that he was above.

“Isn't that the Hatake boy?”

“Is it? No, couldn't be…”

Iruka blinked. Hatake… He knew the story of Sakumo, the story of a fallen hero who was pushed to take his own life. And he knew that Sakumo had a son.

That son was said to have died over a decade ago.

The captive and his four guards passed by and Iruka held his breath as a sharp, dark eye settled on him. He felt ashamed now—embarrassed for staring—but couldn't bring himself to look away. So, he waved. It came across as awkward as he expected. Then the eye was off him, the man was gone, and the world started up again.

Iruka lowered his hand to his side and frowned. Suddenly, a check with the gate guards didn't seem like such a bad idea.

“Something wrong, Mr. Umino?”

Iruka had to fight to pull his attention back to the journalist. His frown was still there, brows knitted together in obvious thought. “Fine,” he assured, “I just…”

He couldn't help but glance at the retreating back of the silver-haired prisoner. A Leaf shinobi he'd never met…

He offered Sukea an apologetic smile. “Sorry, could you wait here a moment? I have something I'd like to check.”

“Can I tag along?” The notepad shoved into Sukea's pocket was already in hand, eyes bright in a tell of just how eager he was. He thought there was a story here. Great. Fantastic.

Iruka rubbed his neck and took a retreating step back. “Best not,” he replied. “I think this may be a confidential matter.”

Sukea pouted but never made to follow as Iruka ran over to the gates. Iruka was grateful for that. While he highly doubted the matter was  _ actually  _ confidential—they wouldn't have made a scene by bringing Hatake through the front gate if it was, would have at least used a chakra cloak or snuck in through a less traveled street—he was pretty sure the details surrounding it weren't something an outsider should be privy to.

Izumo and Kotetsu sat in the booth, halfway through a game of shogi. Kotetsu's idea, no doubt, and Iruka wondered how in the world he got his partner to agree to it. There would be other chances to ask. Izumo was winning, anyway, which was no surprise. Kotetsu's eyes lifted and he grinned, chin resting lazily in his palm. “Fancy seeing you here,” he greeted, sizing Iruka up. “You look like hell.”

“Same to you.”

“Ouch, Iruka,” he gasped, pretending to be offended. “What's got you in such a mood?”

Iruka arched a brow, and he could have answered with a plethora of things. But he didn’t. Instead, he nodded to the gates and the village housed within them. “That man. I’m guessing there’s a story there?”

Kotetsu’s smile fell. He twisted forward, the game of shogi forgotten as he leaned heavily on the booth. “Well, you could say that.”

“Kakashi,” Izumo supplied. He was still sitting sideways, gathering up the pieces and cleaning up after their game—which had been deemed a lost cause, because Kotetsu was  _ terrible _ at shogi. “Well, he’s been missing for over a decade now… I suppose you wouldn’t know of him.”

“Missing?” he echoed. Missing, not dead. Well, very  _ obviously _ not dead. “Who found him?”

The guards exchanged glances. Kotetsu sighed and dropped his chin in his hand, looking very much like he didn’t want to have this conversation. That, itself, was unusual; Kotetsu loved gossip, if only as a distraction to the unending boredom that came with gate duty. He liked embellishing stories, making up dramatic extensions to truths he’d been told. Right now, though, he looked awkward sharing. “Showed up of his own accord,” he confessed, “looking like he’d just been through war. It was a damn shock, seeing him drag his half-dead ass down the road.”

“Kotetsu ran ahead to take a look at him,” Izumo explained. “I called for backup. They’re bringing him to the hospital.”

Four jōnin guards for one injured man. They must’ve had high expectations to be sending out that many high level operatives to act escort—no. No, they weren’t just escorts. This was a jōnin who’d been missing since before Iruka even made genin; they couldn’t trust him. Not blindly, and not right away. He would have to answer to his decade long absence with an explanation that the Hokage approved of, and he would need to prove his loyalty.

Before Kakashi could ever be welcomed into the village, there would be a trip to T&I.

Poor guy. Inoichi could be quite the character to deal with. Iruka would know; Inoichi’s daughter was in his class.

He turned back to the guards to find Kotetsu watching him with an unreadable expression. “We think he’s been in Kiri— _ ouch _ ! Stop that!” Kotetsu yanked his hand away from Izumo and rubbed it, a red mark slowly spreading across the skin where Izumo pinched it.

“Kotetsu,” Izumo cautioned, hidden threats in his voice. “It’s not our place.”

“What?” he whined, glaring back at his partner. It lasted all of three seconds before he submitted, averting his eyes with a huff and propping up his legs on the booth. “It’s just speculation. Not like I’m givin’ away village secrets, jeez…”

Iruka wordlessly shared his sympathies. They’d shared more than enough and his curiosity was sated so he bid them goodnight and returned to Sukea. The walk home was quiet and awkward, Iruka’s mind still on the curious arrival of the missing jōnin. Kakashi Hatake went missing for over ten years, huh? How did someone do that, though? How did they find themselves pulled away from their village for so long? In most cases, those unaccounted for were lost casualties to enemy lines or rogue ninja. Missing-nin. Their village’s burden.

Kakashi was a man claiming loyalty after a decade-long absence. If his sentiments were sincere then, wow… To hold onto loyalty after so long. It was something to admire. Iruka wasn’t so sure that he would have the same drive.

They reached the apartment door and he brought down his wards, unlocked the door, and considered Sukea for a moment longer. Despite his curiosities, Sukea hadn’t asked for any details. He’d been completely respectful after the first time he was told ‘no’ and Iruka could appreciate that.

“Do you…” He scratched his cheek and cast his eyes heavenward. “Want some tea?”

Sukea stared a while, through the awkward silence hanging in the aftermath of the offer. Iruka was a bit surprised when he found a guest at his kitchen table as they waited for the water to boil. It was the first time anyone had visited since the last time Naruto came over for a ramen night about three weeks prior, and while Iruka was tired, the company was nice. His apartment felt so big and empty with just one person living there. They didn’t talk much. Well, they  _ never _ talked much. Sukea was there with offhand compliments and friendly charm, with innocent questions that carried them across absent conversation. Iruka responded with answers and more tea.

At some point, he woke up to the first streams of daylight casting across his bedroom wall. He thought that he must have dragged himself to bed once Sukea left, but as he poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down for breakfast, he realized that his wards were still down. Iruka  _ never _ forgot to put up his wards; it’d been a part of his nighttime ritual ever since his genin days.

A thought crossed his mind and he smiled, warm and soft as he sipped from his mug. Sukea may have had a bad taste in journalism, but Iruka was coming to find that he made up for it in other ways.

* * *

Iruka’s interest in Kakashi Hatake may have died down after satisfying his initial curiosities, but the village around him was still  _ very much _ enamoured. Leaf shinobi were spreading rumours like wildfire. It didn’t matter if they were chunin or jōnin; everyone wanted to know Kakashi’s story. Iruka learned a lot about him from the whispers of parents as they came to meet their children after exams—that he was a prodigy in his time, the last remaining of the Fourth Hokage’s students. A genius, an academy graduate at the age of five, chunin at six. He was the son of the White Fang and the last remaining member of the Hatake clan, a ninjutsu specialist and carrier of the sharingan.

There were other rumours, too. Ones less focused on his accomplishments. Some said that he had to be a plant for Kiri—that he disappeared during a mission where Kiri happened to be involved, that all of the Kiri nin he fought were left dead on a bloodsoaked battlefield and that he was the only one unaccounted for. Maybe he was a missing-nin, others said, trying to reinstate himself into the village. To get close to the Hokage. To bring back a body for a meager reward. Then there were others who wanted to believe that he really had been unable to come back before then.  _ He’ll be an indispensable asset to the Leaf,  _ they insisted.  _ He’s useful. _

Evidently, Kakashi was still hospitalized. No visitors. Iruka took the long way home one night, conveniently passing by Konoha Hospital. He could sense the unmistakable cloak of ANBU crawling all over the place. Four of them. Apparently, they’d upgraded his guards from jōnin to ANBU because of… reasons. No one seemed to know why. Because he was deemed dangerous, maybe. Because he’d taken out his last set of guards? Possibly. No one cared about the why, only the  _ what _ .

Iruka sat in the teacher’s lounge with a stack of exams piled high on the table next to him. A few of his coworkers were taking a coffee break across from him, making smalltalk and laughing and teasing  _ him _ for being a workaholic—which he  _ wasn’t _ , not really. He was just dedicated. And this was Naruto’s class. And Naruto’s exam. And Naruto was looking like he was going to make it to the next grade by the skin of his teeth.

Iruka sighed. Rather than coffee, he needed alcohol. The strong stuff, because that boy was going to drive him over the edge. All those extra lessons, and Naruto barely managed a passing grade.

He finished late that night, as he did every night. But, exam period was over. He had a good month and a half free of classes and sure, he needed to create an outline for next year, but there was plenty of time to do it. No rush. He could  _ breathe _ again.

Iruka thought about waiting until morning to make his monthly trip but couldn’t bring himself to follow through. He passed by the hospital again on his way there. Now there were  _ six _ ANBU scattered about instead of four, all focused on the third floor, one at the entrance, and he wondered what Kakashi did to warrant  _ that _ .

He stopped by Yamanaka Flowers. It was cute, watching little Ino try her best as her dad stepped back and allowed her to complete the sale. And, as always, it was odd, knowing that the friendly, doting father standing there in an apron was one of the core members of the Torture and Interrogation Division.

Konoha Memorial was blanketed by dusk by the time Iruka got there. The dark may have been a problem if he didn’t know his way around as well as he did. He didn’t need to be able to see. His feet moved through the aisles on autopilot, eyes glancing over the tens of dozens of names he had to cross to get to the ones that he was there for.

He got to the row second closest to the back and slowed to a halt as his eyes came to rest on a tall, dark figure hanging over one of the graves. Kakashi stood there with tired eyes and a blank stare. His back was slouched, hands hidden in the pockets of his pants. Iruka could see gauze poking out from beneath his shirt, discoloured flesh on the bare skin that showed beneath his sleeve.

Ah. He’d snuck out. Iruka didn’t necessarily  _ approve _ , but—

Wait.

He snuck out.

Six ANBU guards and he  _ snuck out _ .

Iruka gawked openly at the man. A dark eye scrolled his way and he opened and closed his mouth but no words came. He reached for something to say but nothing seemed very  _ right _ , and with Kakashi still being hospitalized, it was doubtful that T&I had been called in yet. That meant that Kakashi’s loyalty hadn’t been confirmed.

_ Missing-nin _ echoed in his brain and he forced it back behind a friendly smile. “Sorry, am I interrupting?”

Kakashi considered him for a moment longer before turning to the grave. Iruka did the same.

_ Minato Namikaze. _

_ Kushina Uzumaki. _

Ah. Kakashi was visiting his old jōnin instructor. There was something kind of sweet about that, and suddenly the tension lifted. He wondered if Kakashi knew about Minato’s death before now, wondered if news had reached him, wherever he’d been over the past decade. If the rumours were right and he spent his youth as a prisoner of Kiri, it was doubtful.

Kakashi came back to a very different Konoha.

Iruka bowed his head politely before slipping past. He changed out the flowers at both the Hokage and his parents’ graves, set out incense. This time he hadn’t been able to bring food but he was pretty sure he would be forgiven.

He felt Kakashi watching him. It was a piercing sort of gaze, the kind that was cold and hard and made him want to shrink in on himself. But he tried to be sympathetic, tried to put himself in Kakashi’s shoes. If he’d spent a decade as a prisoner in foreign lands, he was pretty sure that he’d be cold and wary of others, too.

How young must he have been when he was pulled away from Konoha? How much of his childhood did he lose?

There was shifting. Iruka peeked left to see Kakashi crouching down next to him, mimicking his stance, offering silent words with a closed eye, and he smiled.

“Lord Fourth was a great man,” Iruka assured, casting his gaze back to the large, polished stone. “The village meant everything to him. You should be proud.”

Kakashi said nothing, but there were silent words hidden beneath the howling winds, and he thought he heard a quiet whisper,  _ I am. _

Iruka nodded and they sat there beside one another, comfortable and complacent. Eventually, though, he thought it best to leave or druge up conversation; Kakashi hadn’t said a word, didn’t seem much like the socializing type, and Iruka did not do  _ well _ with those types of people. He struggled for a topic before his brain decided that the best route was the Naruto route and that was never a good thing, but the bottom line was this cardinal rule:  _ don’t think too hard. _

“I’m an instructor at the academy,” he said, and he didn’t know why. The words came, but there wasn’t any real reasoning behind them. “Did he ever give you the Will of Fire speech?”

There was nothing, but Kakashi was watching him again, so maybe that was reason enough to continue.

“The Third gave it to me,” he explained, “when my parents died. I was just thinking,” and he faltered there, because there was an eye on him and he wasn’t so sure what he had to say was deserving of attention, “that Lord Minato embodied that ideal. He gave everything for the village, and then passed his will onto the next generation.”

Iruka rubbed the back of his neck. Maybe someone just escaping a lifetime of torture and confinement wouldn’t appreciate that level of sentimentality. Oh well, he tried! “It’s a nice sentiment, at least, don’t you think?”

Kakashi watched him openly for a moment, then turned back to the grave, brushed a hand along Minato’s name.

His eyes didn’t look so distant then.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I took an unintended hiatus from writing and I'm sorry for that. I successfully completed my 20K Nanowrimo entery, so for all intents and purposes I should have been ready to get back to work on my fanfiction, but honestly, the 20K I wrote was pretty terrible and I've scrapped most of it. I guess it left me a bit discouraged, so I haven't had the motivation to write. It felt like a big waste of time. On the bright side, I've now learned that I work terribly on deadlines! That's gotta be good for something, right? I've also taken several steps back and started world building that story again from the ground up, so maybe one day I can give a second go at it.
> 
> I can't promise that I'll do frequent updates, but I'm going to try to work on my fics again, even if I can only spit out 1k a week or something. Wish me luck!
> 
> Heads up that the start of this chapter has a little overlap with the last chapter!

Kakashi crouched, perched high in a tree with his cloak still active as he stared dully down into the grass below. Tobi was there, sitting on a hollow log, right out in the middle of a clearing. He gripped the stem of a flower between his thumb and forefinger and plucked the petals off one by one, watching them float along the wind to the ground. That was his eighth flower. Surprisingly, he wasn’t complaining. There was no whining or flailing, just contentment. A level of focus.

Tobi was a strange, strange creature.

As much as he hoped his disguise would be enough to gather the information that he needed, it wasn’t; no one was willing to discuss the kyuubi attack with an outsider, so there was one option left. After this, he would  _ definitely _ land himself in Konoha’s bingo book. That was fine. It was just one more entry to add to the list. He was already in Kiri and Iwa’s. Kumo’s, too, if he had to guess.

He checked the sky. Judging by the sun, he was late to their meeting by oh, say… three hours? He was making good time.

Kakashi leapt down and landed soundlessly in the grasses below. The cloak lifted the moment he hit the ground. Tobi’s head swivelled around and he shrieked, throwing the half-plucked flower at Kakashi’s face.

“Wah, Senpai! Where were you?! Tobi’s been waiting for  _ three hours _ , Senpai!”

Kakashi smiled with his eye and wandered over, waving sheepishly. “Sorry, sorry.”

Tobi stomped his foot, emphasizing his frustrations. “You’re so mean! I’ve been waiting and waiting and  _ waiting _ —”

“Maa,” Kakashi consoled, grip tightening around the offering in his hand that Tobi seemed oblivious to, “life has many paths, Tobi. I just took one that you weren’t on.”

“Th—” Tobi hesitated. That was a first. “That’s so cruel, Senpai…”

Kakashi lifted his arm and held up his peace offering, smile sunshine-bright and totally, entirely fake. “Dango?”

Tobi gasped. His hands came up to his mask, as though covering his mouth, and all the gloom and dejection was gone. He ran up and snatched the dango out of Kakashi’s hand. Oh, good. The flailing was back.

“This is why you’re my favourite!”

Kakashi sighed and waltzed on by, dropping onto the log. He reached up and gripped the wig, pulling it down off his head. The patches that made up his markings went next, then the makeup. Tobi watched closely with noises of curiosity and wonder.

The disguise was off and Kakashi looked up, through the hole of Tobi’s mask, to see a wavering eye staring back. He wondered what it was about his face that caused Tobi’s act to falter.

It didn’t matter.

Tobi dropped down, sitting cross-legged on the grass as he admired his treat. He looked away, the mask went up, and pleasured noises followed. “So, so? What do you need me for, Senpai?” His words were obscured by mouthfuls of dango. Then the mask was down, facing Kakashi, Tobi’s chin resting in his hands.

Kakashi hummed and closed his eyes, as though he had to think on it. “Mmm, I wonder…”

“Senpai,” Tobi whined, pout clear through his tone. For a man with no known face, he was good at exaggerating his voice and body language to convey his emotions. That was something that came with practice. Kakashi knew personally.

“I’m taking a different approach now.” This wasn’t the time for overworked facades and posturing. Kakashi’s tone was flat and his words succinct as he rested his elbows on his knees and leaned forward. “From what I gathered, a gag order was placed on everything involving the night of the kyuubi attack. No one, shinobi or civilian, will speak to an outsider about it. At this point, I’m wasting my time.”

Tobi’s head cocked to the side. “And? What are you going to do about that?” His tone changed. The pitch was lower, calm with a slight edge to it. This was Tobi’s real voice, one he’d heard so rarely before. “You’ve been paid.”

Kakashi arched a brow, amused. “Maa, you make it sound like I’m trying to get out of the mission. I told you before: my success rate is my pride. I won’t blemish it so easily.”

Tobi was quiet for a moment. “So?”

Kakashi smiled and retrieved the hitai-ate from his scroll, placing it over his sharingan eye. “Hit me.”

Tobi stared. Then, like a switch, his arms were in the air, flailing and confused. “ _ Senpai _ ?! No, no, Tobi could  _ never _ —”

Kakashi pulled the cloth mask over his mouth, set it securely on the bridge of his nose, and tapped his cheek. “Full permission. Go ham. Release all that pent up frustration, Tobi. I know it’s in there somewhere.”

The man stilled, considered Kakashi, and nodded to himself. His tone was flat. “You’ve finally lost it.” He released a big, heavy sigh and shook his head. “You're so young, senpai. Too young. What a shame…”

“If I’m going to convince the Leaf that I’m still loyal, I need to be looking the part of a prisoner,” he explained. He wasn’t entirely sure he  _ needed _ to explain—was under the impression that Tobi could connect the dots on his own—but Tobi was committed to the act, so Kakashi humoured him. “They’ll never believe me if I walk up to the gate completely unharmed.”

Tobi nodded solemnly. “You’d go that far? For one mission?”

He waved the accusation aside. “Maa, it’s becoming a bit more than just another mission, don’t you think?”

_ A bit more personal. _

Tobi hummed, then sprang to his feet and marched over. He looked down at Kakashi through the hole of his mask. “You’re sure, Senpai? Tobi is  _ really _ strong…”

Kakashi flashed a humouring smile. “Just don’t kill me. The mission will be significantly harder to complete from hell.”

“Tobi would  _ never _ !”

They shared a nod. Kakashi heaved a sigh and made to rise to his feet—

Before he made it to his full height, there was a shin in his gut. He heard something crack as he was flung backwards into a tree. The wood splintered under his weight and he hissed through the pain as his body slid down, dragged by the pull of gravity.

He never made it to the ground. Tobi was there in an instant, like a ghost, fisting Kakashi’s shirt, holding him there, arm reeled back as far as it could go. Kakashi’s hands came together in an automatic seal but he stopped himself.  _ No, _ he remembered,  _ it’s for the mission. _

Tobi’s fist slammed into his cheek and his jaw creaked beneath the force. He was thrown, body rolling across the ground like a stone and sinking into the earth. There was so much raw  _ power _ behind the blows that he was momentarily stunned. He never expected Tobi to be physically strong. He expected Tobi to be a ninjutsu specialist, with the way he teleported like it was second nature, the weird disappearing acts that he pulled.

Kakashi coughed, sucked wheezing air into his lungs as he got onto his hands and knees to pull himself back up.

Tobi kicked his side and a pained noise escaped him as he fell back down. A hand wrenched his shoulder, forced him onto his back, and soon there was a weight on him. Tobi’s weight. He clenched his jaw and braced himself for the next series of blows. They came one after another, again and again. Fists slammed into each of his cheeks, against the side of his head. For a moment, his vision blanked.

He was starting to think that Tobi was not the best person to ask for assistance.

When sight returned to him, Kakashi looked up. Tobi’s body was silhouetted by sunlight, casting dark shadows over his mask, and through the hole was a red eye blown wide.

_ Ahh,  _ he thought. _ The sharingan. _

Tobi held one hand at the ready, the other gripping tightly to the front of Kakashi’s shirt, head tilted. “Hey, Senpai,” he called low with a voice that sounded like the usual happy-go-lucky act with a lot more spite, “is taijutsu enough, or should we add ninjutsu? Make it more convincing?”

Kakashi’s head slammed back into the dirt and his eye squeezed shut. He waited, ready to take whatever blows he needed to get this out of Tobi’s system.

None came. The hand on his shirt came loose and the weight on his chest lifted. He could breathe again, which was nice, and he watched as Tobi stood, looking down on him with that glowing eye.

“It’s no fun if you don’t fight back,” Tobi said quietly. The sharingan receded.

Kakashi blinked and he was alone. His every bone and muscle ached and  _ screamed _ when he tried to move, so he just lay there, staring at the sky, feeling like he just got crushed beneath a thousand ton boulder. He coughed and could feel the sticky wet heat of blood on his mask and breathed through the burn.

_ Well, _ he thought, ever the optimist,  _ I’m not dead. _

* * *

Kakashi vaguely recalled stumbling his half-broken body to Konoha’s gates, partially because of the mission and partially because there was internal bleeding that he should  _ probably _ address. He cast a dark eye on the booth where two guards sat but couldn’t make out any details beyond the confirmation of their uniforms. It was only when he stumbled and lost his footing that one of the guards got up close enough to see. Kotetsu wrapped an arm around his back, tucked beneath his arms, and suddenly it was significantly easier to carry his weight. Maybe that had something to do with half of it being supported by his long-time junior. The pain clouded his thoughts too much to tell.

Slowly, Kotetsu lowered them both to the ground. Shaking hands tucked under Kakashi’s arms but he didn’t mind all too much—or, well, he  _ did _ , because everything  _ hurt _ and he now understood why giving an S-rank missing-nin full permission to beat the crap out of him was a terrible, horrible, no-good idea—but it was okay. It was easy to distract from his own broken aches when he was staring into such a nostalgic face. Kotetsu had grown up so much since they last met all those years ago, but he was still instantly recognizable. The same kid from back in the days before his jōnin promotion.

It took a moment for Kotetsu to register just what— _ who _ —he was seeing. His breath hitched, caught in his throat, and he tentatively asked, “Kakashi…?”

Kakashi forced a hazy eye up to catch the shinobi’s face, but he couldn’t manage any words. He worked his jaw only to find it swollen and painful and decided that speaking wasn’t  _ necessarily  _ something that he needed to do.

Kotetsu swallowed, carefully lowering them both to the ground. “ _ Sage _ ,” he breathed, “it’s been years… What did they do to you?”

Huh. Kotetsu already trusted him. That, he hadn’t expected.

He was vaguely aware of a one-sided conversation as four jōnin approached from within Konoha. One assessed his wounds and treated a particularly nasty break in his leg before he was led inside, through the streets, feeling dozens of eyes on him as he staggered on like a prisoner of war, wrists bound behind his back, seals placed on his arms. He hadn’t been the source of that much attention in many, many years. It made his skin crawl, being watched like that.

As he walked, his eyes caught on a familiarly scarred face in the crowds. Iruka Umino, his mind supplied. An academy instructor. That was the man with the strange sensory talent—the one who felt out what should have been a perfectly enacted sealing cloak. As Sukea, he was drawn to that man. Iruka no doubt knew something or other about the kyuubi attack. He made for a good starting point, though his resolve to adhere to village code was ironclad and Kakashi had yet to get anything out of him. To his left stood a clone—Kakashi’s clone, still in full disguise. Ahh, he looked forward to the memories he’d get once it dispelled.

He realized he was staring only when Iruka stared back. An awkward wave followed, amusing in ways that it probably shouldn’t have been. Kakashi knew what it must have looked like, seeing someone all battered and bloody brandishing a Leaf headband, being led by four jōnin through the streets. He heard the whispers of an age-old name—Kakashi Hatake—amongst the crowds. People knew. They all did.

To have the bearer of that name look at him and only him must have spiked Iruka’s unease.

Oh well.

* * *

Kakashi sat up. He was not supposed to sit up, but he did anyway. There were protests from the abused skin of his lower back and his head swam as he tried to right himself. The blows to the face that Tobi gave him were doing a lot more harm than he thought that they would. A part of him wanted to be resentful but, well. He brought it upon himself and couldn’t be mad, no matter how hard he tried.

Kakashi had a soft spot for Uchihas. His hand went up to his closed sharingan eye, a strange mix of warmth and dread pooling in his gut as his mind flashed back to a pale face framed by wild, dark hair. Tobi was from Konoha. While Kakashi knew of no defectors from his time in the village, he heard the name Itachi Uchiha spread around like an uttered curse, a man said to have wiped out the entirety of his clan in one cruel, bloodied night. He did not think that Tobi was that man. But perhaps Tobi was a survivor. The massacre of a clan was more than enough incentive to defect; Kakashi left for less.

He released a long, burdened breath and looked around. The smell of disinfectant pulled at the nostalgia in his brain and forced him back to a time when he was half as tall and twice as bitter. Konoha Hospital was a place with which he was intimately familiar. He spent more than his fair share in that hospital, pushing himself past his limits to complete his missions at whatever the cost. Kakashi was a ruthless child. His teammates hated him for how cold-hearted he could be on a mission, how easily he would abandon them if they became a hindrance to his goal, but he treated his own body with the same neglect. For a long time after the death of his father, Kakashi would wake up in one of those stiff, miserable beds alone, feeling all of the aches and pains of his latest mission at once.

Towards the end, something changed. He remembered blood, shouted words that his brain could not comprehend, and then he woke up. Hospital room. Disinfectant. Flowers at his bedside. Rin was there, by his side with warm smiles and friendly assurance. Then, by the window, looking every bit like it  _ pained _ him to be there, was Obito Uchiha. Arms crossed over his chest, dark eyes averted to the grey skies behind the glass, a slight colour to his cheeks.

It was easy to get lost in memories when so completely, utterly alone.

A flood of memories not his own hit him all at once. His clone dispersed, he surmised, as he sifted through an entire day’s worth of activity. ‘Sukea’ spent the vast majority of the evening with Iruka Umino, listening to a lot of long-winded rants until the topic of his ‘story’ came up. Iruka tried to comfort his fruitless efforts, which was amusing if nothing else, and then there was the encounter in the street. Kakashi saw himself through his clone’s eyes, felt the way that Iruka took strange interest in his presence.

Iruka invited him inside. They drank tea and shared meaningless, empty smalltalk until the poor, exhausted schoolteacher was passed out across the kitchen table. Kakashi was a good guy, at least some of the time, despite his missing-nin epithet. He brought Iruka to bed, pulled the sheets up, and quietly slipped out.

Kakashi wished he could have had that evening, instead of being poked and prodded by a gaggle of short-tempered nurses. They weren’t mad at him, so much as they were angry at whoever had  _ done _ that to him.

Tobi should have been scared.

The door clicked open and Kakashi watched the Hokage enter, clad in white robes and that pretentious old hat. He looked old in ways that he hadn’t before, aged and weathered and so completely exhausted. Hiruzen returned to his seat after Minato died. Forced back into power as the Hokage with the longest reign.

Hiruzen took one look at him and his eyes softened. He shuffled wordlessly into the room and pulled up a chair. The legs scraped gratingly against the tiles, loud and pitched and everything Kakashi did not need for his headache in the moment. Soon Hiruzen was seated, meeting Kakashi at eye level.

“Kakashi Hatake,” he greeted, longsuffering and tired. “You were one of Minato’s students.”

Kakashi observed him for a moment before casting his attention to the bed sheets bunched around his middle. He weighed the pros and cons of answering. “Yes, Lord Third.”

“You’ve been gone a long time.”

“Yes, Lord Third.”

“You were captured?”

He fisted the sheets and said nothing. No one would ever truthfully believe that an enemy kept a prisoner alive for over ten years without them talking. They would have deemed it a fruitless effort and killed him. And really, Kakashi could not explain away his absence in a justifiable way because he  _ was _ a missing-nin.  _ But _ , he had a plan. That plan meant that he had to keep his mouth shut.

Hiruzen sighed and his head fell forward, the brim of his hat casting long shadows across his face. “No matter. We’ll know shortly,” he said softly. “For now, rest up. Once your injuries have healed some, you’ll be meeting with the Yamanaka clan for an assessment. You understand, I’m sure.”

“Of course.” He was banking on it, actually.

There was a hand on his shoulder then, tight and firm, and Hiruzen smiled. “Welcome home.”

No words before those had ever left such a bitter aftertaste.

* * *

ANBU did not appreciate being played. They had no sense of humour, really, and Kakashi pitied them for it. After the first time he snuck out—to stretch, though the nurses told him that stretching was a no good, very bad idea at that point in his recovery—the number of ANBU present increased from four to six. By the second time, Kakashi got so stir crazy that visiting Minato and Kushina in the graveyard sounded like a mighty fine idea.

It amused him, running into the schoolteacher there again. Kakashi never spoke, was unsure what kind of persona he should put on with the man. He didn't want to come off sounding like Sukea—that was just asking to be discovered. So he stayed quiet, listened as Iruka carried on a one-sided conversation. He never felt as awkward as Iruka looked.

The next day, the number of ANBU went from six to ten.  _ Ten _ , for  _ one _ man. A bit excessive, but that was fine. He suspected the Yamanaka would be brought in soon and this whole business would be dealt with. Maybe then the black-ops team would ease up and go back down to two guards. Maybe then, Kakashi could get some work done.

When he heard a knock at the door, he expected the Hokage with a Yamanaka in tow. He did not expect the smiling face of a familiar chuunin to be what greeted him when he turned his head. To his questioning stare, Iruka grinned and held up his hand. A paper bag dangled from his hand and the scent wafting from it was mesmerizing. Kakashi was stuck on a strict diet of hospital food and misery and it was killing him inside.

“Sorry, am I bothering you?” Iruka sheepishly scratched at his scar. When there was no immediate refusal, he crossed the room and placed the bag on the stand by the bed. “I asked the nurses what was okay to feed you. I know how bad the food here can be.”

Kakashi considered the bag but before he could remark, Iruka was already in the hall again waving.

“Take care!”

Then he was gone and Kakashi was left to wonder what just happened.

* * *

By the end of the second week, Kakashi found himself seated in the heart of T&I Headquarters, hitai-ate level on his forehead and dissimilar eyes staring lazily at the blond man hovering over him. He remembered Inoichi. They were never acquainted on any personal level but they left enough of a mark on the mind to carry their way past introductions. Inoichi was a man with devastating ability hidden behind a kind smile. He leaned back against the edge of the table, arms folded over his chest as he wordlessly assessed the potential threat before him.

The room was windowless, dark save for the bleaching lights above that didn't quite reach the corners. Kakashi easily located the four ANBU guards awaiting him on the other side of the wall and resisted the urge to sigh. Well, the number was down from ten. That was something. Not much, but something.

Inoichi’s stare lingered a moment longer before he picked up the file resting beside him on the table and thumbed through it. Everything was still as he read Kakashi's decade old documents, so very out of date. He purposely looked in painstaking detail to raise the tension, to make Kakashi sweat. Kakashi didn't, of course, but it was an admirable effort.

“So, Mr. Hatake,” Inoichi started, sounding only half interested in the dawning conversation, “you claim to have been in Kiri over the past several years, is that correct?”

“Yes.”

Inoichi nodded, predicting the answer. “And what is it you did during that time?”

He didn't answer.

Inoichi looked up and their eyes met. Kakashi’s sharingan spun, weaving a carefully prepared genjutsu as his interrogator approached. Inoichi went still and it took hold, bringing the conversation to a momentary halt before it continued one-sided.

“I see,” Inoichi sighed, setting the folder back down and shifting about the room. “Well, Mr. Hatake, I'm going to have to verify your claims, is that understood? My clan has a rather frightening jutsu that can do just that. I'd like to ask for your consent.”

Kakashi's eyes shined amusement as he shifted against the back of the chair, crossed his legs and slouched comfortably. “Maa,” Kakashi tilted his head, “do your worst. I look forward to it.”

His words went unheard and Inoichi nodded, smiling in assurance. Kakashi kept their gaze locked firmly as fingers came to press against his temples and a rush of chakra flooded him like a wave. Inoichi was not seeing Kakashi's ten year long missing-nin career, though. There was no battlefield likened to a river of blood, no dead Rin held tightly in his arms. Kakashi saw the day he defaced the metal plate of his hitai-ate in show of his resolve, but that memory was his and his alone.

Inoichi saw something very different. His eyes went wide at what must have been the most brutal of tortures in between periods of blackness. Blood and blades and smoke and skin. Fire burning brands into his back, energy drains leaving him on the brink of chakra exhaustion. And if they checked, he had the scars to prove it.

Kakashi may have been a prodigy, but he made his fair share of mistakes.

Kakashi blinked and the genjutsu ended. Inoichi looked at him, really  _ looked _ at him, and pulled away. There was silence as the Leaf-nin absorbed everything that he saw and his face faded from concern to sympathy.

“You've been through quite the ordeal, I see,” he breathed. He placed a hand on Kakashi's shoulder, firm and reassuring. Inoichi was a man who could smile in the face of tragedy, and Kakashi envied him for it. “After all that, you still came back.”

Kakashi averted his eyes and released a long, tense breath. He could never admit to the tiny spark of guilt he felt in that moment so he buried it deep beneath the layers of a calm facade where it wouldn’t be a nuisance.

The hand fell away and Inoichi crossed the room, taking a seat in the far desk. There were papers scattered there, the contents of a blank manilla folder that Kakashi suspected to be his brand new T&I file. Soon, the silence was filled by the methodic scratch of pen against paper, Inoichi filling out the report in meticulous detail. Judging by the fact that Kakashi hadn’t been hauled off by ANBU yet, the genjutsu must have worked. The story he wove of a memory hazy from trauma, of torture with blank spaces in between, was believed.

Well, one nuisance dealt with.

“I’ll submit a full report to the Hokage,” Inoichi stated, “but I don’t suspect that Lord Third will take issue with you returning to your post, if you’d like.”

He very much did  _ not  _ like. Mission or no mission, Kakashi was none too keen on playing the role of a Leaf shinobi again. But he just closed his eyes, nodded. Accepted it, at least surface level.

“Be sure to make a full recovery first, though. And take some time to adjust,” Inoichi chastised. “Don’t think that I didn’t hear about your hospital escapades. It’s quite the feat, to leave the ANBU sweating like that.”

He arched a brow and tried to suppress his amusement. He was playing the role of a tortured soul, after all. “I only wanted fresh air.”

Inoichi laughed. “Oh I’m sure you did.”

Kakashi smiled with his eye and allowed quiet to fall once again as the report was completed. The Yamanaka was relaxed enough to laugh; he fully, wholeheartedly believed what he saw. Completely and utterly.

By the time he left the hospital, Kakashi would be a member of Konoha again and no one would stop him.

* * *

Kakashi took the token recovery time to assess his options. The one month Tobi estimated the mission at was already laughably behind and he was surprisingly okay with that.

At some point, the Akatsuki assigned mission evolved into so much more. Something personal. He was a bit bitter when he found out that this information desired on the jinchūriki was a lot more extensive than initially expected; it was Konoha's most well-guarded secret.  _ No village secrets—was that what you said, Tobi?  _ Most civilians seemed to think that the attack was the will of a rogue demon, a monster set loose upon their village without reason. Only shinobi made the connection that the tailed beast was Konoha's purposefully sealed offence. Those familiar with battle were a lot more understanding of just what took place that day—chunin, jōnin and ANBU alike.

Kakashi wished they would fill him in. It would make his job a _ hell  _ of a lot easier.

He smiled at the waitress from behind his mask and she smiled back in that very cautious, very worried way that she did. She bent forward and the rim of a short teacup clinked against the table, the tea within dark and clear and steaming. Then she was gone and he was alone and he was fine with that. His book was set next to him, begrudgingly closed as he worked out his next move.

In all honesty, he hadn't a clue who Minato would have given possession of the kyuubi to. Who was trustworthy enough to hold such raw, terrible power? Who could the Fourth Hokage trust not to abuse it? This was a curiosity that Kakashi held even outside of the mission and it was a big part of why he was going so far for it. Tobi didn't need to know that, though. He doubted that the Akatsuki cared about sentimentality. 

If only the same could be said for their grunt, currently hovering over his shoulder like an over-eager mutt.

Kakashi was practiced at ignoring Tobi’s incessant ramblings, so much so that he actively managed to tune out the too-close voice in his ear.

“Senpai,” Tobi whined, “Senpai, don’t ignore Tobi! Are you mad? You’re still mad. Oh dear.”

Kakashi was not mad. Kakashi was a bit bitter, maybe, and perhaps irritated. He’d broken several ribs, fractured his leg in multiple places. And his face? Well. It hadn’t looked like a face for  _ weeks _ after the assault. His whole back had been bruised and tender, as was the skin on his arms where he blocked Tobi’s assault. Some of the blows were furious enough to split skin, and there’d been more than a little blood on his clothes that day.

Kakashi was  _ not _ mad; he was  _ dedicated _ to the mission. That was why he refused to acknowledge the masked asshole looming over his shoulder and put all of his focus on the notepad placed before him. He thumbed through the pages one by one and looked over his notes with careful precision. No one spoke to ‘Sukea’ of their knowledge of the kyuubi attack, but there’d been tells—flinching, aversion of the eyes, restless fidgeting—that told him who  _ did _ actually have knowledge that they were unwilling to share. Iruka was one, most definitely, and he planned on exploring the friendly schoolteacher as a source of intel in the future, but there were others.

He could safely assume that anyone of high rank that was around during the time of the attack—that is to say, the time of Minato’s death—would have valuable knowledge to share. If he got desperate enough, he could try to use the sharingan to get answers out of them. He rather use a less risky approach, but the option was there. Next, there came the people that he spoke to. Most civilians were aware of the attack, but not the details. Shinobi seemed to have more in-depth knowledge, so Kakashi would start with them. It worked in his favour; most of the people he knew from his life in Konoha were ninja. Rekindling old friendships—well, no, he was not really  _ friends _ with any of them—

Kakashi needed to brush up on his people skills. If only there were a manual. The last friends he had were Obito—who died the moment that their friendship blossomed—and Rin. When he closed his eyes, he could still see Rin. Eyes blown wide, skin pale in the light of his chidori.

Kakashi twitched when he felt a sudden, unrelenting weight press down against his back. Tobi hung on him, arms resting over his shoulders, hands flailing and restless as they so often were. He managed to keep any reaction from breaking through his cool indifference, but a part of him may have wanted to use a trusty old C-rank Fire Release jutsu to burn the moody, facade-wearing freak’s mask off.

“Senpai!”

He went through the names one by one, crossing out whichever he deemed was a dead end. Once that was done, he added names to the bottom of the list, people he remembered from the academy, or from missions—Genma, Maito Gai, Asuma, Kurenai. The Hokage was a lost cause; there was no way he’d prod Hiruzen, of all people, for information, but there were plenty of other options from his past.

Who was left that Minato was close to? He tried to think; Kushina was dead, and both Minato and Kushina had no family left to speak of. There was Jiraiya but, last he heard, the old Sage was travelling. The jinchūriki wouldn’t so easily be allowed out of the village. And Minato’s students, well… Obito was dead. Rin was dead. Kakashi was very much  _ not _ dead, but was also  _ not  _ the jinchūriki.

Who else was there? The question grated him and he found himself tapping the back of his pen anxiously against the table.

“ _ Senpai _ !”

That time, Kakashi couldn’t stop himself from giving the masked bastard his attention. He glared for the briefest of seconds before smoothing himself out. That was  _ loud _ . And in his  _ ear _ .

“Senpai,” Tobi stage whispered. “Please stop ignoring me. Tobi’s sorry. Very, very,  _ very _ sorry.”

Kakashi plastered on the hollowest of smiles and dropped the pen. It rolled away, teetering on the edge of the wood. “Maa maa, Tobi, I would never ignore you.”

“You did! You totally did!”

“Senpai is just thinking,” he assured. When this job was done, he planned on showing Tobi just how he got the name Cold-Blooded Kakashi. That sentiment may have carried through his words against his will because the eye watching him from behind the orange mask was searching his face.

Suddenly, Tobi pulled away and took a staggering step back. “Senpai, you have a scary look on your face.”

Kakashi adjusted his smile and leaned forward, chin in his palm as he assessed the Akatsuki member with a lingering eye. “You’re saying strange things, Tobi. It hurts my feelings.”

Tobi twitched, narrowing an eye on him—a break in the act that Tobi, himself, may not have noticed. “Please don’t be angry, Tobi just wanted to help.”

Kakashi’s smile dropped. He ignored Tobi’s words as he considered the freshly-inked names on in his notepad. Each of them was little more than a distant memory. When the time came to act, he wouldn’t know the first thing to say to them. As much as Kakashi could play the charismatic journalist, he was a  _ bit _ emotionally stunted.

“Say, Tobi…”

Tobi tilted his head. “What is it?”

Tobi was probably not the best person to ask. Kakashi didn’t exactly have any other options, though. “How do you…” This was a missing-nin, the strangest missing-nin Kakashi knew, a member of a secret organization with some pretty shady plans working in the background. Kakashi was asking the wrong person. He knew that he was, but it was too late. “How do you relate to people?”

Tobi blinked behind his mask. “What?”

Kakashi let out a long, put-out sigh and drummed his fingers against the wood of the table. “Engage people,” he elaborated. “Make friends. You’re good at inserting yourself into situations where you’re not wanted; I need that skill.”

More than ever before, Tobi looked completely at a loss. There was a brief moment where Kakashi saw a crack in the facade, a sliver of honest befuddlement slipping through. He thought it would be stamped out within seconds, but no. It took a lot longer for Tobi to pull himself back together, lowering himself down on the bench beside Kakashi. “That is a backhanded compliment, senpai.”

“Humour me.”

Tobi reached around, rubbing the base of his neck. “I wouldn’t know,” he said, simply. The silly, over-the-top voice was there, but muted, sounding so much closer to normal than what he normally allowed. “That doesn’t mean anything to me anymore.”

Kakashi hummed. He removed his mask and downed the last of his tea, allowing Tobi a moment to collect himself. “You’re the brooding type, I see.”

Tobi leaned an arm against the table and pointed an accusing finger at Kakashi’s chest. “I don’t want to hear that from  _ you _ .”

Kakashi smiled. It was the brightest, warmest smile he could muster. “Say, Tobi…”

Tobi narrowed his eye. “What?”

“Be a good boy and pay for Senpai. Clones don’t carry cash.”

“Wait, Kakashi—”

Kakashi waved, waggled his fingers, and disappeared in a rush of smoke. Tobi was left alone on the tavern patio, a very cautious waitress giving him the stink-eye.

The shadow clone’s memories flooded Kakashi’s mind as he heaved a sigh and snapped his book shut, settling a dull eye on his apartment. The room was quiet and largely empty, save the books beside him on the floor. No futon, no table, no chairs. No pictures hung on the walls or teakettle on the stove. It looked nothing of a home and Kakashi was fine with that. He wouldn’t need it for long.

As he rose to his feet, the sound of his name on Tobi’s lips sent a buzz through his brain and he stilled. That was the first time Tobi said it. It itched at a part of his brain long buried, a nagging thought from years past that he couldn’t place.

Tobi was an endlessly curious creature.


End file.
